Fantasy baseball comes in many shapes and sizes. The most popular format is redraft leagues, followed by keeper leagues. Dynasty leagues may lag the other two, but they’re growing in popularity.

There isn’t a textbook definition of a keeper or dynasty league. The best way to differentiate is keeper leagues entail retention of players from one year to the next, but there is also significant turnover in the player pool. On the other hand, dynasty leagues involve carrying over almost all the rosters. A league doesn’t have to be one of the other. Hybrid formats where there is something in between a lot and almost no pool churning can combine the best of both worlds.

After the startup season, the yearly draft inventory in keeper leagues encompasses everyone not frozen and those on expiring contracts. Those tossed back into the pool are deemed not worthy of their contract, and inevitably include some of the upper tier talent. As such, rebuilding in a keeper league can take as little as one year.

After the initial Dynasty League draft, emerging minor leaguers and maybe fringe major leaguers comprise the available player pool. Once your dynasty team’s window to win wanes, it is a lot harder to reload and be competitive. The reason for this is while you are focusing on players to help you capture the flag, others are forgoing winning to assemble a fledgling roster about to hit their stride and make some noise.

I’ve been playing fantasy baseball since 1988, but I’ve never drafted a dynasty league squad from the beginning. I’ve taken over established teams, but I’ve never had to strategize how I want to approach the league; it’s always been dictated by the state of the inherited team, which is typically not very good.

The fine folks in the Fantasy Index Discord Channel asked me if I’d like to join their startup dynasty league. While I’ve been cutting back on leagues to focus more on work, such as providing content for the Fantasy Index Baseball Draft Kit, I viewed this as a chance to check off a bucket list item, as well as a source of content fodder. I know, I need a more exciting and challenging bucket list.

There are several considerations when formulating a plan for dynasty leagues. Perhaps the most important is whether there are a few jellybeans on the line for the top finishers. Can you afford to be contributing jellybeans for a few years, hoping the league is still vibrant when your team is ready to dominate and enjoy collecting jellybeans for a multiple season stretch?

Another is your confidence in rebuilding a depleted roster. Most often, winning necessitates dealing a significant portion of your future for immediate help. Gerrit Cole may be one of the best pitchers in MLB, but he’s 33-years-old. Cole is clearly still effective, but if he’s on dynasty team in rebuilding mode, when the team is ready to rock, Cole may not be able to roll. A team with designs on winning may be willing to deal Grayson Rodriguez or Eury Perez, because “flags fly forever.”

These were my chief factors when contemplating a scheme. This is a free league, so that wasn’t pertinent. However, there were a couple of nuances with the league rules pointing to “win now and build a foundation with an extended window.” Before getting specific, playing both ends of contrasting approaches usually manifests in doing neither in an optimal manner. Perhaps this is a mistake on my part; time will tell.

The primary reason I decided to focus on competing and assembling a dynasty is this is a shallow (to me) 12-team mixed league. I play in 10- and 12-team mixed leagues, but I mostly participate in 15-team mixers along with 12-team AL or NL only formats. A young player must be really good early in his career to be worthy of a 12-team mixed league roster spot. Success of even the best prospects isn’t guaranteed. I prefer to spend my early draft capital on younger players with an encouraging track record, yielding a competitive team for the next several seasons, while I stash high upside prospects who are several years away from being an MLB asset.

The other element in my decision was the head-to-head nature of the league. There are multiple narratives in this realm, with one being you don’t need to be the best team all season, just the best (or luckiest) in the playoffs. If your team is pacing to make the playoffs, you can make some trades to improve the club for the fantasy postseason. Concentrating early draft picks on current major leaguers gives the team a better chance to be in contention for a playoff berth.

With that as a backdrop, here are the guidelines I used for the draft.

1. Use early picks on younger but established players.
2. Read the room, and if there is an early focus on prospects yet to make their debut, don’t hesitate to draft the older, but still very productive players pushed down the draft board.
3. When drafting prospects, go for upside, even if the player is years away from MLB.

Baseball has unwritten rules, so does fantasy baseball. One is, “No one cares about your team but you.” Anyone still on Twitter, I mean X, knows many pundits haven’t received the memo and post every pick of every team they draft. Granted, there are some cases where people do care, and I’m going to assume that’s the case here.

It’s 12-team Head-to-Head, with 6x6 scoring. The extra categories are OPS for hitting and holds for pitching. We use weekly scoring with a 22-man active roster and six MLB reserves. The farm roster has up to 40 minor leaguers. Twelve hitters and 10 pitchers are active each transaction period. One each at catcher, first, second, third, shortstop and infield, four outfielders and two utilities comprise the hitters. There are no restrictions for the pitchers. I had the second pick. Presenting my squad in the inaugural Fantasy Index Dynasty League.

By position:

C: Adley Rutschman

1B: Triston Casas

2B: Gleyber Torres

3B: Elly De La Cruz

SS: Xander Bogaerts

IF: Paul Goldschmidt

OF: Julio Rodriguez, Nolan Jones, Christian Yelich, George Springer

UT: Edouard Julien, Spencer Steer

SP: Kevin Gausman, Logan Gilbert, Sonny Gray, Nathan Eovaldi, Chris Sale, Brandon Pfaadt

RP: Raisel Iglesias, Pete Fairbanks, Bryan Abreu

HIT RES: Byron Buxton, JD Martinez

PITCH RES: Logan Allen, Nick Pivetta, Luis Severino, Jason Adam

I like the mix of young players and veterans. You won't see any of the top prospects on the minor league roster, but by my count (and rankings) I have eight of the Top-100 prospects. In a 12-team league, everyone should have around eight. Plus, I promise there will several future Top-50 prospects as the current top minor leaguers lose prospect status.

By means of a sniff test, I compared my starting 22-man roster to an ADP from a league close to the same format. The goal is having a roster with at minimum, every round represented, but hopefully "better" than the ADP. The idea I drafted a few younger players earlier than their ADP and some older players after. However, the roster could be rearranged to emulate a redraft league.

 The left column is the round of the player's ADP. The number in parentheses is where they were drafted. That is, Grayson Rodriguez (5), Christian Yelich (12) and Raisel Iglesias (18) all have an ADP in Round 6, but I drafted one in the fifth, another in the 12th and the third in the 18th. Admittedly, when using one's own rankings, everyone should "beat" the ADP, but it was comforting to see it occurred even with early focus on younger players.

I'm happy to address questions pertaining to my team in the comments. 

Todd Zola is an award-winning fantasy baseball writer and 2020 inductee into the Fantasy Sports Writers Hall of Fame. He's the content provider for the 2024 Fantasy Baseball Index Draft Kit, available now. To purchase, click HERE.